Davis New Vertical Feed Sewing Machine Manual

A PDF manual for the 

Davis New Vertical Feed Sewing Machine 

can now be found in the files of the Davis VF Yahoo group.

Have a nice day.

Quilting is slow, Knitting is slower.

Duh.

It is a thought that has crossed my mind though, several times, over the past year since I learned to knit.

Just to try out a little idea I have for some socks, it will take a while.  I have to figure out how to fill in the rest of the foot with the plain color yarn.

Once I finish the heel.

And do the other sock to the same point so I don't get mixed up later and do the second one differently by mistake.

You would think I was engineering a bridge or a building with how much brain power this has been taking up lately.  I love these type of problems!

And, if I just break down the parts into sections, I find it easier to know what is the next step I have to figure out.  So far, it is going good!

Anyway, I have been thinking about painting again, just for the immediacy it offers in terms of results, as in pictures out of your brain and out into reality!

Something to put on the front burner for 2017.

In the meantime, today is a crazy, blustery, stormy day, a lovely, stay inside and continue to be delighted by this delicious yarn, lazy Sunday!

Life is good!

*****

This, just in...

And then there is the magic of awesome, from Fairy Little!

knitting a sweater in only 24 hours!

Repairing an Antique Quilt. Photo Story.

This is bound to be a pretty nerdy post.  But if you are interested in this type of repair, there is lots to see.

This seems to be roughly made in the 1920's, a one-patch hexagon quilt.  There are a lot of older than that fabrics in it, like late 1800's, possibly earlier, but who among us doesn't often have their mom's or grandmother's scraps in their stash?!

It was very lightly soiled, which I was not tasked to correct.  My job was simply to repair the several ripped or shattered patches.

To begin, I marked the damaged patches with the yellow scraps to identify them all.

Then, I made a cardboard template the finished size and traced around with each fabric and adding seam allowances as I cut out.

When making the template, I considered the maker when deciding on a size.  Of course measuring each one, a bit different, hmmmm.  But if you think about it, whomever it was that made this did not use a slide rule or a micrometer to draft it.  Guaranteed.  Each patch was like some weird number across, like 2 5/8 or 2 7/8, because of course, she probably cut her template out of cardboard and just kept it in her scrap basket. Maybe she traced it out of a magazine.  The edges wore down over time and time tracing around it. Also the quilting and the washing has drawn it in some.  But I felt it would be an easy number. So I rounded up to 3" to allow the patch to draw up with the quilting.

It is good to keep on hand a selection of these types of fabrics, collected from here and there for just this type of occasion! If not an exact match, I tried to imitate the shade and style of the original as much as possible.

Once all the patches were cut and placed, I appliqued each one on, matching the points, and then quilted to match the original style of hand quilting.

A light (very light!) steam and pressing with the iron after that was just the thing to get the new patches to exactly blend in texture-wise.

I did keep the yellow markers on there as I went and until I returned the quilt to the customer.  

Because even I had trouble finding them all.

A good sign of success!

I hope this was helpful to you!

Happy Sewing!

-Sarah